President Donald Trump said in a new Truth Social post that the ballroom was “under budget and ahead of schedule.”
President Donald Trump shared an update about the White House Ballroom after the Supreme Court ruled that he could continue with the construction for now.
“Tremendous work has been done on the magnificent BALLROOM/MILITARY COMPLEX being built on the grounds of the White House!,” the president wrote on Truth Social. “Presidents have wanted this for 150 years, and so has everyone else. It will give the White House, and all of D.C., Great National Security. The Project is under budget, and ahead of schedule! The Ballroom will be paid for with ZERO Dollars of Taxpayer Money. Great American Patriots and Companies are footing the entire bill. President DONALD J. TRUMP.”
The ballroom is estimated to cost $300 million to taxpayers according to NPR, despite Trump insisting that the burden of the construction won’t fall on the public.
The latest Supreme Court ruling allowing the administration to continue construction came after months of back-and-forth between Trump and the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which sued to halt construction of the ballroom. According to the nonprofit, the president has to get approval from Congress to continue the construction. Trump, on the other hand, has argued that the ballroom is a necessity and has claimed there is a lack of space to host events, especially for foreign dignitaries.
The Supreme Court had until Friday to decide on several lower courts’ rulings halting the construction.
In a brief order signed on Friday, Chief Justice John Roberts stayed the lower court ruling to pause construction.
“Rather than obtain permission from Congress, Petitioners have instead decided to try to outrun judicial review” by accelerating construction. “It is clear that in Petitioners’ view, if the Court grants their stay application, this case is over — despite every court to have reviewed their project having found it to be patently unlawful, and no matter the fact that this Court has not reviewed those decisions on the merits,” the brief states.
Trump praised the decision on social media, saying, “We are grateful for the Decision of the United States Supreme Court. The Military/Ballroom Complex being built on the hallowed grounds of the White House, which is so vital for National Security, will be THE GREATEST OF ITS KIND!”
he ballroom is expected to be a 90,000-square-foot addition to the White House and twice the size of the main part of the White House complex.
The courts got involved in March this year, when Republican-appointed federal Judge Richard Leon ruled against the administration and said that the construction could take place only in matters of safety and security. The ruling then went to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, which said that construction could temporarily continue. Judge Leon then clarified that below-ground construction of the ballroom could continue but above ground could not.
Trump said on Truth Social that the ballroom was also “vital for National Security and Military Operations of the United States of America!”
The case was then supposed to go back to the appeals court, but the administration then filed an emergency appeal with the Supreme Court.